Egypt finds tombs from the dawn of pharaohs, and clues to the thinking behind the pyramids

Egypt finds tombs from the dawn of pharaohs, and clues to the thinking behind the pyramids

An excavation in central Egypt has brought to light burials from several eras of ancient history, including tombs from the earliest dynastic centuries.  One of those tombs may also preserve signs of the kind of structural thinking that long predated pyramid building. Taken together, the discoveries suggest that Egyptian burial architecture was being tested and refined centuries before the country's most famous monuments appeared. What happened? …